Ash
by artemisgirl
Summary: The world repeats, the Final Battle replaying itself out in front of Draco's eyes each day, ending in a cloud of ash and fire. No one else seems to realize it, that they're trapped. It's only when Draco realizes that Hermione's aware of the time loop too that he begins to understand what's happening, where he is, and exactly what it means. Dramione oneshot.


**A/N:** Written for QLFC Round 5. My prompt was "(Pocket Dimension) Write about the things that could happen inside a 'space pocket' where the inside is bigger than the outside. Eg: Hermione's beaded bag (with extendable charms), a wizard's tent, a sphere that holds a small universe with a different set of physical laws, etc."

My additional prompts were: 1. [Word] Fire; 4. [Emotion] Determination; 9. [Song] Shatter Me by Lindsey Stirling

This fic is inspired _heavily_ by the Lindsey Stirling song and the music video for it. I recommend listening/watching to it before/during reading the fic.

The word count for this story is **2,899**, not counting the Author's Note. The total looks higher than that because this site counts each individual period as a separate word, when it's _not_. But so just know that - I didn't go over the 3000 max. (Judges, if you don't believe me, I can provide the DOCX file so you can do a word count to verify.)

* * *

**Ash**

The ash was like snow, drifting in the air.

If Draco only looked up at the white sky and the gray ash, he could almost pretend nothing was wrong, that it was winter, and it was just snowing.

It wasn't winter, though. It was May.

From behind him, he heard screams and the roar of the fire, and he closed his eyes.

The world tilted, and Hogwarts burned.

.

.

.

Draco had first become aware that something was wrong when he awoke on May 1st from the most lifelike dream of his life. He'd dreamed of the Final Battle, of Voldemort's forces attacking Hogwarts, of Crabbe casting Fiendfyre at Potter and his friends and the spell going wildly out of control.

As the day progressed, Draco became more and more certain he was going mad, or he was somehow wildly precognetic.

When twelve hours later, Crabbe raised his wand with a sneer, Draco lunged for his arm.

"No! Don't-!"

The Fiendfyre went wildly out of control, the Room of Hidden Things consumed in the flames.

Draco closed his eyes in despair, barely aware of one of Potter's friends snagging his robes and pulling him onto their broomstick.

The Fiendfyre consumed the school a few hours later, ash thick and clogging the air, and Draco watched as the world swirled around him again.

.

.

.

It always ended the same; Voldemort and Harry would die, and the castle would be consumed in fire. Then the world would tilt on an axis, the ash swirling around like snow, and the next thing he knew, he'd be waking up.

Draco had always thought knowing the future would be a boon, a cool thing to use to your advantage and shape the world how you wanted.

He hadn't realized knowing exactly how the worst day of your life would play out each time would be worst thing imaginable.

It was like being dead each day…

But you still had to wait to die.

.

.

.

Each day, the world reset.

Each day, the world ended in ash and flame.

Each day, it was his nightmares come to life.

And each day, Draco felt more and more dead inside.

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.

At first, Draco did nothing, trying to figure out what was happening. After that yielded no results, he tried changing things, seeing if he could break the loop.

He gave his mother her wand back and stole a different one. He evacuated the Slytherins early, getting them to safety faster. He tried to animate the stone statues himself one time, but it seemed only a professor could do that.

He tried warning people, too. He told the Headmaster what was going to happen, but he only gave a grim smile and looked prepared. Draco tried telling McGonagall, too, but she only tutted at him, informed him Divination was a woolly sort of magic, and took points off him for starting trouble.

Like house points still mattered, when ash clogged the sky.

.

.

.

"No! Don't-!"

He lunged at Crabbe, tackling him roughly to the ground. Crabbe hit a pile of lost books with a hard "oof!" and Draco scrabbled for his wand, snatching it and backing up, breathing hard.

"There," he said, glaring at him and pointing his wand at him. "Now you can't cast Fiendfyre."

Crabbe and Goyle let their mouths drop open for a moment, before they began accusing him of being a traitor. Which he was, Draco figured, at this point; one couldn't really stop a Death Eater from attacking Potter and _not_ be a traitor of some kind.

Potter didn't even look grateful, Draco noticed. He just looked kind of stunned, same as Weasley, with that stupid surprised expression on his face. And Granger…

Granger looked like she'd just had an epiphany, and her eyes had a certain glint that Draco recognized.

That was determination.

He saw it in the mirror himself every time he woke up again.

.

.

.

"You're aware of it."

Draco turned to see Hermione Granger standing in the corridor of Hogwarts, looking at him expectantly. He stared at her.

"You're not supposed to arrive here for another four hours," he said numbly.

"I know." Her tone was conversational. "I skipped the bank heist this time. Made Fleur go instead of me."

She tilted her head, looking at him critically.

"How is it you're aware of what's going on, and no one else is?" she questioned him.

Draco took in her calm demeanor, her utter certainty and confidence in what was going on, and Draco recognized a lifeline when he saw one.

"I have no idea," he told her, "but _please_ let me know when you figure it out."

.

.

.

Hermione had been hesitant to tell Draco what was going on at first, but Draco was determined to wheedle it out of her. After the third time he ran into her early, she finally relented, agreeing to tell him the next time if her current plan didn't work.

"I'll only tell you because I don't know what else to do," she informed him. "And if you use the knowledge to make things worse and help Tom win, I'll Obliviate you myself."

Draco wasn't sure how much worse things could be, when the world ended in ash and fire every day.

.

.

.

Harry had lost the Final Battle, Hermione told him. He and Voldemort had cast magic at each other at the exact same time, their wands had reacted oddly, and the magic had exploded, causing a magical spark that set the school on fire.

Hermione had decided that that outcome wasn't acceptable.

She had a Time-Turner, and she used it to go back and fix things. She'd stripped the safety restrictions off, forcing it to go back further, instead of its usual maximum of six hours. And when she'd gone back, she'd twisted the body of the Time-Turner as she went back through time, murmuring below her breath, and encapsulating the time sands into a globe.

Draco had stared at her as she explained. She squirmed under his gaze.

"In order to change the past, I needed to unwrite it," she explained, uncomfortable. "That meant splitting the strand of time and killing the previously-written universe and timeline."

She'd gone on, describing some arcane ritual she'd done, but Draco tuned her out. He didn't care _how_, only _what_ she had done.

And what she had done was trap all of Hogwarts in a stable time-looped bubble inside of a snow globe. He was inside a _literal snow-globe_, that Hermione escaped out of and shook up every twelve hours, resetting the world again each time Harry died.

"This way, I can figure out what we need to do differently to win the Final Battle before I actually do it," Hermione told him. "Time works differently in here, separately. The only time I'm spending in the real world is the ten seconds or so to shake the globe each time, and I had an hour or so of free time before I needed to go to Gringotts."

She'd prattled on, describing what she'd discovered so far, going on like absolutely nothing was wrong, and that was when Draco cursed her, unable to restrain his rage.

She'd blocked it and stunned him back, to his disgust. But when the world dissolved into ash that day, he felt a grudging respect.

At least _she_ knew what was going on each day.

Even if they all did end with ash and flame.

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.

.

"Granger," Draco drawled, entering the Room of Hidden things, flanked by Crabbe and Goyle.

The Wonder Trio turned to look at him, Potter's eyes widening. Hermione raised an eyebrow.

"That's off-script," she commented. "Usually you greet Harry, not me."

Harry turned to look at her incredulously.

"Hermione, what-?"

"Go get the Diadem, Harry," she said, waving him off. "I'll handle this."

Obedient, Potter and Weasley scampered off, and Hermione turned to face him, folding her arms.

"Are you going to behave, or am I going to have to disarm you again?" she questioned.

She looked utterly confident and comfortable, standing there.

Which made sense. _She_ could leave this hellish snow globe whenever she desired.

"I wouldn't say I'm going to _behave…_" Draco drawled, and his minions sniggered from behind him.

In a whirl and a couple flashes of red light, both Goyle and Crabbe were out cold, and Hermione was staring at him.

"…but I want to help," Draco finished. He gave her a determined look. "Let me help you figure out what we need to change, Hermione."

She gave him a careful, evaluating look.

"You called me Hermione," she commented.

Draco fought the urge to squirm.

"Isn't that your name?" he shot back.

"It is."

She regarded him for another long moment, before she extended her hand, and Draco seized it and shook it before she could take it back.

"I accept your offer of help, Draco," she said, her eyes glinting. "Meet me at Hagrid's Hut each day at two."

He helped battle against the Death Eaters, that time, openly blasting them alongside Neville Longbottom, of all people. They still lost, and Harry still died, but Draco felt a little better about seeing the world dissolve into ash and fire after he had.

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.

.

Hermione had charts. Of course she had charts, Draco figured – it was _Hermione Granger_.

She had charts of everything that had happened during the Final Battle. Who had been where, when.

The amount of detail was staggering.

She'd marked down everything she'd tried so far to change things. Changed their escape from Gringotts. Changed the order they destroyed the Horcruxes in. Changed who fought whom when.

Nothing had worked so far. Each time, Harry and Voldemort died, the school caught fire, and the world dissolved into a cloud of ash.

But at least Draco didn't feel so alone anymore when he watched the ash float in the sky as each day died.

.

.

.

So Draco helped Hermione, each day.

Each day, they tried something different. Something new, to change the timeline.

Each day, the ash swirled around and fire consumed the school, and the day reset.

But each day felt _different_, now.

And that made all the difference in the world.

.

.

.

"So we're going to try destroying Nagini _before_ 9 o'clock," Hermione told him eagerly. "I think this might work – if we get rid of all the other Horcruxes earlier in the day, Tom will be even more unstable at the final fight, and Harry might be able to finally…"

She trailed off, giving Draco a suspicious look.

"…were you even listening?" she demanded.

"Kind of," Draco admitted.

She huffed, crossing her arms.

"What were you thinking about, if not the importance of the plan?" she wanted to know.

Draco's lips quirked.

"You," he told her. "You're radiant when you're passionate about something, you know."

Hermione blushed a brilliant red, sputtering, before hurriedly going back to explaining the plan.

Hermione blushing was endearing, Draco decided. He resolved to make it happen more often.

.

.

.

Each day, the world reset.

Each day, the world ended in ash.

And each day, Hermione mattered more to him.

And each day, Draco felt more and more alive.

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.

"You realize that you can't come with me, right?" she told him one day. "You're part of this sub-universe. There's another _you_ in the real world, still thinking today is like any other day, utterly unaware of what's going to happen."

"Then _take me with you_," Draco urged. "Forget him – he's going to try and blast you and your friends. Take me with you – I'll replace him like you replaced yourself."

Hermione gnawed on her lip, considering, before turning back to her charts.

"We're going to try ambushing the werewolves before they attack," she said, pointing to the forest on her map. "If we can slow them, that might give the Order a greater chance to fight."

Draco sighed.

When the ash swirled around him some short hours later, determination seized him, and he felt his will resolve.

.

.

.

Over time, Draco began to suspect Hermione was hiding something.

Each time, she would delineate some change to the day to do, but the things she was suggesting they try were minor, things that couldn't possibly change the outcome of the Final Battle. But she picked each change to the timeline each day, stayed and planned it out with Draco, before she had to go back and help rob Gringotts again.

It was in the shadows of her eyes, the subtle looks she gave him when she thought he wasn't looking.

Draco wondered if she hadn't grown fond of him too.

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.

Each day, the world reset.

Each day, the world ended in ash.

Each day, Draco wondered a little more.

How had she grown to mean so much to him…?

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.

.

He confronted her. He had to; he was determined to get out of this hellscape.

He demanded answers. She cried when he did, nodding when he accused her of delaying the inevitable. And he took her in his arms to comfort her as she cried little sobs into his chest.

"You're scared," he told her. "No, I get it. I feel it too."

Hermione looked at him, her eyes wet, and her bottom lip trembling.

"I'm… I'm scared of it changing," she admitted, her voice quiet. "Here, the days stay the same."

"Hermione…" Draco cupped her cheek and tilted her head to look up at him. "The world might be spinning, but only in gray."

Hermione looked around at the ash floating around them and closed her eyes, her resolve warring with fear on her face.

"Break the glass," Draco told her. "Take me with you, and I'll catch you when you take the dive."

Hermione opened her eyes, determination glinting inside.

"Fine," she told him. "I'll do it. But…"

"But what?" Draco prompted.

Hermione looked uneasy.

"…But Harry has to die."

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.

Draco couldn't believe it. It _worked_ -– Potter dying beforehand was all it took. Hermione explained it – something about him housing part of Voldemort inside of him – but as Draco watched as Voldemort turned to ash, floating away in the sky, he couldn't bring himself to care.

"So Snape really _was_ on our side, and he-"

Draco ignored her, his lips swooping down to claim her own. Hermione let out a short noise of surprise, before he felt her shudder and relax under him as she started to kiss him back.

A long moment later, he pulled back, both of them breathless. Hermione's face was flushed and her eyes wide, and Draco knew he was breathing hard.

"Now we do it again," he told her. "For real, this time."

Hermione took his hand and nodded, biting her lip.

"We'll be going into the unknown," she warned him. "No redos, if we mess up."

"Hermione, I've lived this day dozens of times," Draco told her. "We're not spiraling into the unknown. We've _got_ this, okay?"

He squeezed her hand, and Hermione looked sideways at him, a soft smile spreading on her lips.

"Okay," she whispered. "Let's go."

They Apparated.

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.

.

Taking over your own body and consciousness was unexpectedly incredibly painful. Draco spent the first hour of his life in the new timeline in agonizing pain, fighting with himself as his identity tried to assimilate to itself.

It was lucky he didn't need to do anything for several hours; his head was throbbing, and he was thrashing around the room, yelling at himself.

He'd settled down by the time it came to act, and this time, something felt different about it.

This time, Draco felt alive.

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.

The Death Eaters attacked. The teachers and the Orders fought. They found and destroyed the diadem. Voldemort taunted Harry. Harry went into the forest to die. Neville killed the snake, Harry jumped up, and when they fought, the spell rebounded on Voldemort, and he turned to ash.

It was just like it had happened before.

Draco watched the ash drift away on the wind for the last time, satisfaction warming his heart, before he turned to Hermione.

"Are you ready?" he asked her, and she gnawed on her lip.

"I guess so," she said. "Let's go."

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.

He took her up to the Astronomy tower, to do it properly. Throwing it off of the Astronomy tower seemed thematically appropriate as a way to destroy a universe.

The snow globe looked harmless, from here, from _outside_ of it. It looked just like a miniature replica of Hogwarts, and the ash _did_ look like snow, until Draco could see a miniature fire catch and spread inside, and Hermione shook the globe again, resetting it.

"You can't just leave them in there," Draco told her. "It's cruel."

"They'll be unmade when I shatter it," Hermione told him, her eyes earnest. "What right do I have to end all their lives?"

"They're already dead, Hermione," Draco told her. "You made that choice when you went back in time the first time."

"You're not dead," Hermione objected, and a ghost of a smile touched Draco's lips.

"No, I'm not," he agreed. "You made me feel alive."

His lips captured hers, soft, and Hermione softened underneath him, her eyes fluttering shut as she kissed him back. The snow globe tumbled from her hands, and Draco opened one eyes to watch it spin through the air and shatter on the ground.

Unseen, the wind carried away the ash and sands of time.

And the world was remade.


End file.
